Our distinguished grandfathers carried canes, frequently handsome
gold-headed ones, especially if they were ministers. Bishops, or
"Presiding Elders;" when, in those mellow times, it was the custom for
a congregation to present its minister with a gold-headed cane duly
inscribed. Our fathers of some consequence carried canes of a
gentlemanly pattern, often ones with ivory handles. Though in the days
when those of us now sometime grown were small one had to have arrived
at the dignity of at least middle-age before it was seemly for one to
carry a cane. In England, however, and particularly at Eton, it has
long been a common practice for small aristocrats to affect canes.

The dandies, fops, exquisites, and beaux of picturesque and courtly
ages were, of course, very partial to canes, and sometimes wore them
attached to the wrist by a thong. It has been the custom of the
Surgeon of the King of England to carry a "Gold Headed Cane." This
cane has been handed down to the various incumbents of this office
since the days of Dr. John Radcliffe, who was the first holder of the
cane. It has been used for two hundred years or more by the greatest
physicians and surgeons in the world, who succeeded to it. "The Gold
Headed Cane" was adorned by a cross-bar at the top instead of a knob.
The fact is explained by Munk, in that Radcliffe, the first owner, was
a rule unto himself and possibly preferred this device as a mark of
distinction beyond the knob used by physicians in general. Men of
genius now and then have found in their choice of a cane an opportunity
for the play of their eccentricity, such a celebrated cane being the
tall wand of Whistler. Among the relics of great men preserved in
museums for the inspiration of the people canes generally are to be
found. We have all looked upon the cane of George Washington at Mount
Vernon and the walking-stick of Carlyle in Cheyne Walk. And is each